Mayor Jimmy and Mayor Larry: So Similar, Yet Different

Mayor Jimmy came into office an a platform of accepting Mayor Larry's position on the two big issues of the day Lansdowne Park and Light Rail, as well as having the Mayor's Office draw up the draft budget. Only his style was apparently different.

Ironically, neither one of them understands what leadership is. Mayor Larry seemed to think it was bossership, acting as a CEO and giving orders. Mayor Jimmy seems to think it is avoiding confrontation and issues - that running the city is about good administration, not politics, although, ironically, it was Mayor Larry who ran on the "vote for me because I'm not a politician" platform in his first campaign.

Mayor Larry was a big idea man, he wanted to turn the City into a Corporation, something Mayor Jimmy has done a better job of with behind the scenes executive decision making only rubber stamped in public with none of the annoying public debate and confrontation that democracy entails.

One thing, however, that no one could accuse Mayor Larry of was cowardice. The man had guts. He tried to break the OC Transpo workers union - a stupid but gutsy thing to do.

Mayor Jimmy, on the other hand, likes to run away from controversial issues and the public that elected him. When it comes to the battle to protect the South March Highlands he wants to pretend it doesn't exist claiming the previous Council dealt with the issue, when the last thing the previous Council did was defer a motion forward to the new Council.

Mayor Jimmy refuses to meet with the proponents of saving the forest ecosystem, even when they are right at his doorstep (on several occasions), does not answer emails and reportedly diverts emails to SPAM without even having anyone read them. We can only surmise that he does not want to know what the public thinks. But of course he knows very well what the public thinks.

He simply wants to pretend there is nothing he can do so that he can avoid having to choose between the public that votes for him and the developers who fund his election campaigns.

It is time for Mayor Jimmy to show some leadership and try to find a solution for the people of Ottawa rather than running away from the public and the issue.

Only One Choice or One Choice For Change

With Alex Cullen officially out of the race for Ottawa Mayor the race becomes a three way race between Mayor Larry O'Brien, former Mayor Jim Watson and the man with a vision, Clive Doucet.

Unfortunately with the flawd municipal election process that we have many may feel that their only choice is to vote for Jim Watson. Watson is attractive to the left and right for different reasons.

To right wingers who simply cannot bring themselves to vote for their philosophic choice of Larry O'Brien, due to his demonstrated incompetence, Watson is a safe choice - not too radical and someone who will not change the way things are done at City Hall.

To left wingers who fear another O'Brien victory, Watson is portrayed by the media as the only candidate who can stop O'Brien and and as a moderate and a safe choice.

The question for voters is whether safe mediocrity is really what they want or do they want real change to the developer driven administration at Ottawa City Hall. In that case there is only one choice and that choice is Clive Doucet.

Marie Lemay Gets it Right Again

It looks like the National Capital might have a new crusader against the hegemony of the automobile in our society.

Last month she was promoting turning "the national capital into a cycling role-model for Canada" and this month she wants Ottawa and Gatineau "to put public transit at the centre of their plans for city-building, today and over the next 50 years".

The position of head of the NCC has often been criticized for being an unelected and unaccountable position. However, as NCC CEO, Marie Lemay has shown more leadership than our elected Mayor "Photo-op" Larry ever has.

Let's Send Clive to Copenhagen

I would like to congratulate the National Capital Commission, and in particular CEO Marie Lemay, for their enlightened approach to cycling in the capital. The Ottawa Citizen reports:

Ottawa has a car-first, bike-after attitude, says the chief executive of the National Capital Commission. And Marie Lemay said residents have to decide if that's really the way they want to build the future of Canada's capital.

One of the fundamental things that I think we need to have a discussion about is, do we want our National Capital Region to be bike- and pedestrian-friendly? And if the answer is yes, we have to be ready to do the things that implies. It might mean it will be more difficult for cars, for example, she said.

Do we make the decision that bikes and pedestrians come first? And if we do that, everything else follows.

Lemay said the place of cyclists and pedestrians will be a central question in the NCC's new, three-year initiative to develop a plan for Canada's capital. Public discussions on the plan are to begin this summer.

The Ottawa Citizen further reports:

The head of the National Capital Commission says she hopes Ottawa Mayor Larry O’Brien will join her and Gatineau Mayor Marc Bureau as they travel to a major bicycling conference in Copenhagen in June to pick up tips on how to turn the national capital into a cycling role-model for Canada.

“If it is him, I’ll be thrilled and, if it’s not, and it’s a councillor, I’ll be very happy. The important thing is that we do have a political champion with us,” said the NCC’s CEO.

Mayor Larry O'Brien as a political champion of cycling does not seem to be a very good fit. Indeed, we need someone to go the the conference who is already a political champion for cycling, who has the background and can come back even more enlightened and energized to lead Ottawa into a new future that is not dictated by the automobile. Who better to fill that role than Councillor Clive Doucet, who will almost certainly be back on Council after the next election, unlike Mayor Larry who does not even know yet whether he wants the job.

The Velo-city Global 2010 conference will feature four days of presentations and discussions by cycling experts and policy-makers from around the world. Topics include cycling in mega-cities; cycling in cold, hilly cities; suburban cycling; and lifting the social status of the bicycle, among many others.

The sheer fact of being in Copenhagen and observing the cycling culture there is also an important aspect of the trip, Lemay said.

“They definitely do put cyclists and pedestrians first. Even the signage at street lights. The priority is not to the car,” said Lemay.

“To see that and be immersed in a totally different way of thinking, then you can see that it can actually be done. I’m hoping from there, you move backwards, and say, ‘what do we like about this, and how can we get there?’ ”

Although the NCC has maintained recreational biking paths in the national capital region for 40 years, Lemay said she realized last summer the importance of moving beyond those paths to create a safe, integrated network of cycling lanes and pathways across the downtown cores of Ottawa and Gatineau.

One thing Marie Lemay has right, and that Clive Doucet would agree with, is that we need to build a city for ordinary cyclists. As the Ottawa Sun reports:

“When you have Lance Armstrong sending in a bib from the Tour de France, I mean, that accident went around the world,” said Doucet. “I think people are beginning to realize Ottawa is a wonderful place to be a recreational cyclist, but a terrible place to be an ordinary cyclist.”

Doucet said the reputation Ottawa had built as a cycle-friendly city had little to do with the municipality’s efforts. The National Capital Commission established and continues to maintain the vast network of bike trails that earned the city its good standing in the first place.

“If you strip away the NCC shared bicycle pathways, the city has nothing,” said Doucet.

Lemay makes the point that while avid cyclists may cycle anywhere and everywhere all the time ordinary cyclists will only cycle if they feel it is safe.

Lemay, who lives in Chelsea, said she owns a bike but is not an “avid cyclist.”

She said she’d love to bike around downtown Ottawa, but she’s concerned about safety on city streets. She believes this gives her something in common with other people who would like to use their bikes more, but don’t feel comfortable cycling in traffic.

“This is not about accommodating the avid cyclist. This is about integrating cycling into a sustainable mode of transportation,” Lemay said.

“It’s not about just one segment of the population. It’s everybody. It’s me. It’s all the other people that could be using their bikes if it was safer. If it was easier.

The City of Ottawa has to show that it is serious about changing from being subservient to the automobile to embracing the future, a future that already exists in much of Europe.

I have already presented my ideas and I encourage everyone else to let the City and the NCC know what they think.

Mayor Larry and Reasonable Doubt

While O’Brien may have been “walking a fine line” in his conversations with Kilrea, Cunningham said, “I am unable to conclude beyond a reasonable doubt that he committed a criminal offence.”

-- Justice Douglas Cunningham, quoted in the Ottawa Citizen

While the trial may be over and the verdict in, thousands of Ottawa residents still have more than a reasonable doubt as to Larry O'Brien's competency as Mayor of Ottawa.

Mayor Larry's Lawyer Calls His Client a Stooge ?

The Ottawa Citizen reports:

Lawyer David Paciocco said the law Crown prosecutors used to charge O’Brien was never intended to apply to conversations between private individuals who are unable to affect a government patronage appointment.

The article continued:

He called these “Larry, Curly and Moe conversations” between private citizens.

We know who Larry is. Who are Curly and Moe ?

The Everyone Else Does It Defence

Is this the best that Mayor Larry's defence team can come up with.

No More OC Transpo Strikes - Why

One sentence says it all:

"Acting Mayor Michel Bellemare, along with the city manager, solicitor, and OC Transpo general manager worked out the deal with the union’s local president Andre Cornellier and international representative Randy Graham over the last few weeks."

Ottawa Mayor Larry O'Brien Resigns

In a statement issued 2009-04-01 00:01, Mayor Larry stated:

The time for me to step down has come. When I first decided to give up my position as the CEO of a pseudo high tech company to run for mayor many of my friends thought it was the most foolish thing I had ever done. But I was determined to win the race and prove that you can fool most of the people most of the time. Many of you may think that giving up this lucrative position during a time of economic uncertainty is a foolish thing top do but I assure you, and you know that my word is my bond, that I am no fool. For those that do not believe that I would ever do such a thing all I can say is that I am not fooling. It is time to move on. I would like to thank all of my supporters, especially those few that still support me, and especially my Chief of Staff, Avril Fuhl.

Farewell Larry.

Mayor's Task Force Misses The Point

According to the Ottawa Citizen

"The mayor's task force on governance found that city council does not operate effectively and cannot provide the strategic leadership the City of Ottawa needs because of systemic problems with governance," says the report from the panel, which includes former Carleton University president Richard Van Loon and is headed by University of Ottawa government expert David Zussman.

The Citizen article further states:

To combat this, the task force recommends creating an executive level in municipal government, the mayor and city councillors who chair various standing committees, to set a firm agenda.

Zussman said this group would then drive the city-wide political agenda at council, making it more likely that other councillors would take a larger view of the issues before deciding how to vote.

The mayor's task force misses the point, or perhaps it was supposed to miss the point. There is no structural problem. The city has functioned well in the past and will function well in the future. The problem will be fixed at the next election, or possibly sooner, depending on the verdict in the mayor's bribery trial.

The problem of lack of leadership and lack of vision is because the city has a mayor who has no clue about politics and leading a municipal government. It has been clear from the start when he refused to learn about the city administration or even attend a city council meeting before being elected.

It has cost the city dearly, especially when compared to what could have been if the voters had chosen differently and elected a proven leader knowledgeable and skilled in municipal politics with a long record of accomplishments.

Labour-Management Relations at OC Transpo – Moving Forward After The Strike

This was a strike that had to be, but never should have been. After over 50 days of the workers going without pay and the city going without transit service, and the hardships resulting from that, we ended up with a settlement that we could have had without a strike.

But the fact is that it took a strike for OC Transpo and Mayor Larry to realize they could not impose their position (the main issue being the rollback of previously negotiated contract provisions) unilaterally.

At this point we have very ill will between workers and management and the potential for a “poisoned work environment”. How do we move forward from here.

The irony of it all is that the very contentious scheduling provisions that we're at the heart of the strike were negotiated as a solution to the ill will between management and workers and a “poisoned work environment”.

The solution put forward at that time, by the consulting group KPMG, was to get both sides to work together for the common good using interest-based bargaining, rather than the traditional confrontational demands-based bargaining. Out of that came a management proposal to change the scheduling system to give the workers more control over their lives. And things did improve.

Then Larry O'Brien was elected Mayor of Ottawa, and he obviously did not bother to learn the history of OC Transpo or he chose to ignore it.

We can no longer ignore history. We not only need to rebuild OC Transpo ridership, we also need to rebuild trust between workers and management. We need to go back to the non-confrontational approach.

Their may be a need for improvements to the scheduling system. If so, they should be designed the same way the existing system was designed, by workers and management taking the time to co-operatively design a better system together.

There will be a lot of challenges to rebuild OC Transpo and rebuild ridership. The chances of success will be a lot better if workers and management do it together co-operatively. We are at the stage of moving into a whole new phase of public transit in Ottawa. We can only succeed if we work together and take advantage of, not only the expertise of hired consultants, but the expertise of our own front line workers who are in contact with transit users everyday.

Both sides could start by providing transit users with an assurance of continued stable transit service by agreeing to use interest-based bargaining for the next collective agreement and agreeing to send any outstanding issues to binding arbitration with no preconditions.

They could start working immediately by establishing a worker-management brainstorming group to develop ways of improving transit service in Ottawa. Not only might this come up with some novel ways to improve service, it will get both sides working together for the common good.

The Phony Safety Issue in the OC Transpo Strike

It is not because safety is not important that I say that this is a phony issue. It is a phony issue because there was no concern raised by the city before the strike began, or even at the start of the strike, or at least no concern that was made public, and Mayor Larry has shown no inclination to keep such concerns private.

The concern was only raised after OC Transpo, and Mayor Larry's, financial arguments about their scheduling position were discredited when the public learned that the current scheduling system was proposed by OC Transpo and that the workers took a pay reduction to pay for the additional costs of the system.

It was simply an attempt to justify the unjustifiable.

However there is a problem with OC Transpo not being under any safety regulations regarding bus drivers' working hours. This is because of the federal government's blatant disregard of their responsibility for inter-provincial (and international) municipal public transit and the lack of appropriate safety regulations. Requests were made, and granted, to have municipal transit services exempted from the federal regulations because the federal regulations were designed for long distance trucking and bus systems and were not suited to municipal systems. The fact that the federal government has jurisdiction over inter-provincial municipal transit systems and does not provide appropriate safety regulations is inexcusable.

The ideal solution would be to recognize that OC Transpo is essentially an Ontario transit service and have a federal-providential agreement giving the province regulatory powers so that OC Transpo would be under the same safety regulations as other Ontario public transit systems.

In the interim I would suggest an agreement (outside of the collective bargaining process) between OC Transpo and the Amalgamated Transit Union to have OC Transpo operate as if it was covered by the provincial regulations.

In the meantime the scheduling system could be referred to mediation, the financial issues could go to arbitration, and the buses could go back into service.

OC Transpo Strike – Who Is To Blame

It is really easy to blame the drivers, mechanics and their union for the strike. However the facts do not support that.

The strike was called when the employer, the City of Ottawa and OC Transpo, presented a final offer and stated that they were not willing to negotiate any further (and they have not moved from their bottom line position since then). That left the workers with the choice of accepting an unsatisfactory offer or going on strike. Further negotiations were no longer an option (although the union indicated its willingness to accept the federal mediators proposal as a way of ending the strike within days of it's start).

We could still blame the workers and their union if the strike had been the result of unreasonable demands by them. But it was not.

The strike was precipitated by an attempt by the City of Ottawa and OC Transpo to rollback previously bargained for benefits relating to the scheduling system. This was a system that was proposed by the employer and negotiated in a non-confrontational interests-based bargaining process over an extended period of time. It was also a proposal that, despite the rhetoric (lies?) of Larry O'Brien and his cohorts, did not cost the City and OC Transpo anything because the workers took a reduced pay increase to pay for the extra costs.

The strike can be settled immediately if City of Ottawa and OC Transpo would accept the workers and their union's reasonable proposal to send the financial package to arbitration and the scheduling issue to a mediation process. The system was developed in a non-confrontational process over an extended period of time. If the city believes it has problems that need to be fixed that is the process to use, a process that may be able to find improvements that benefit both the workers and the employer.

The facts make it clear that it was the City and OC Transpo that that caused the strike and it is the City and OC Transpo that are responsible for it continuing.

City of Ottawa Does Not Believe It's Own Rhetoric – OC Transpo Strike

Special Saturday Fifth Column

The Amalgamated Transit Union has made a proposal that could end the OC Transpo strike almost immediately by sending the financial offers to binding arbitration and submitting the scheduling issue to a mediation process.

Mayor Larry O'Brien, the City of Ottawa and OC Transpo claim that they have made a fair and reasonable offer to the Amalgamated Transit Union and claim that their new scheduling proposals are better for the drivers and are just not well understood by the drivers and their union.

If that is true why are they afraid to send their financial offer to binding arbitration without preconditions and submit their scheduling proposal to a mediation process where it can be explained to and understood by the union and it's members.

There is a word for it when you tell other people something you do not believe to be true.

Solidarity Forever: It Is Time For OC Transpo to Negotiate in Good Faith

In the late 1990s working conditions and morale at OC Transpo were such that it was described as a poisoned workplace, which culminated in the tragedy of the Ottawa Massacre.

Both union and management knew that something had to be done and that the usual confrontational approach to labour-management relations was not working. They sent their negotiators to Harvard University for training and embarked on what is called interest-based bargaining.

That process resulted in the current scheduling system, a proposal that originated with the management negotiators. The union agreed to take a 2 % lower pay increase to pay OC Transpo's added costs due to the system.

As a result of this new approach to labour management relations, working conditions, employee morale, and customer service improved and there was a steady increase in ridership levels over the years.

Then Larry O'Brien was elected Mayor of Ottawa.

It is no surprise that Larry O'Brien does not have a clue when it comes to labour-management relations. What is a surprise is that OC Transpo's top management seems to be eager to join in Larry's union busting strategy. What is not a surprise is that his attempt, bordering on bargaining in bad faith, to go over the heads of the workers elected bargaining committee and appeal directly to the workers has been overwhelmingly rejected by the union membership.

And now, apparently, the city is considering embarking on an all out labour war by using scabs to drive OC Transpo buses.

Do they really think CUPE is going to sit idly by while the city goes after one union at a time. I would not expect to see one snowplough on the road, or any other unionized City of Ottawa worker on the job, the moment after the first scab sets foot in an OC Transpo bus. Larry and his cohorts underestimated the workers solidarity once. Let us hope they do not do it again and cause even more havoc for the residents of Ottawa.

The weather is nice down south. It is time to send Larry O'Brien and senior OC Transpo managers on a vacation and bring in some professional negotiators who are willing to bargain in good faith to go back to the table with the union.

The workers have been on strike for over a month. They are anxious to negotiate a fair agreement. All that is required to settle this dispute is for OC Transpo to bargain in good faith. A little of the co-operative spirit of the 1999 negotiations might help too.

Larry O'Brien's Lies and the Tragic History Behind OC Transpo's Scheduling System

This post is dedicated to the memory of Clare Davidson, Brian Guay, David Lemay, Harry Schoenmakers, and Pierre Lebrun, victims of the poisoned work environment at OC Transpo.


Ottawa Mayor Larry O'Brien would have us believe that it was the union that precipitated the OC Transpo strike and that the scheduling system is costing the city and OC Transpo money.

The truth is the strike was precipitated when management presented a final offer and made it clear that it's scheduling proposal was not negotiable, leaving the union with only two options, accept the offer (the substance of which had already been rejected by 98% of the membership) or strike. Further negotiations were not an option, and as we have seen, are still not an option as far as Larry O'Brien is concerned. Although the union has proposed changes to the current scheduling system to try and address OC Transpo's concerns.

But the biggest lie is that the scheduling system is costing the city money, while the truth is OC Transpo workers absorbed the costs of the scheduling system.

In an effort to improve the working conditions, the Union’s membership voted overwhelmingly to pay for these additional costs itself. Drivers did this by accepting a sub-standard wage increase in 1999. This substandard pay rate continues today. As recently reported in the Ottawa Citizen newspaper, Ottawa’s transit workers are paid many thousands of dollars lower than transit workers in other Ontario municipalities of similar size. Simply put, Ottawa’s drivers are paid lower rates for the benefit of having the current scheduling system.

But the real story behind the strike is the unspoken tragic history of how the current scheduling system came about, a history that I am sure is on the minds of OC Transpo workers everyday they are on the picket line.

In the mid-1990s morale at OC Transpo began to fall, it hit bottom in 1998 and 1999. In response to this both the Union and Management knew that it had to carefully examine ways to turn the workplace around. Management at OC Transpo recommended to Regional Council, and Council approved a study by KPMG that cost in excess of one million dollars.

KPMG recognized the problem, noting in its February 1999 report:

"…[reduced public funding, deteriorating bus fleet, and increasing cost of providing public transit services] contributed to the strife between OC Transpo and its workers, demoralized workforce, resulting in poorer customer service…"

KPMG also noted that both the union and management shared a concern and hoped to work together to improve working conditions. KPMG went on to observe:

"There has been a strong commitment from both the unions and management to recognize the shortcomings of the system and to implement change and improvements as quickly as possible. The level of co-operation, and the commitment to consultation between the unions and management has improved dramatically.”

The KPMG study recommended that management allow the drivers, including their union, to have a greater role to play in the operation of the workplace. KPMG rejected the prevailing attitude in the workplace concluding that “the philosophy that “I put up with it so you have to” has been recognized as inappropriate in today’s environment.”

To further demonstrate their willingness to overcome problems, representatives from both management and the union attended negotiation training sessions at Harvard University. The result was a commitment by both sides to embrace “interest based negotiations” – a process where the parties openly share their concerns, expectations and information in negotiations. The Harvard program was partially funded by the federal Mediation Services department.

Improved morale could not come quick enough though – on April 6, 1999 an employee had entered the Belfast Road bus depot and opened fire – killing four long-service workers. This terrible event, and the memories of four workers, reinforced the need to make improvements in this workplace.

One such improvement was the scheduling system that is presently in dispute. The proposal originated with the employer negotiators – a way that drivers could have more input into the nature of their work. Prior to this, drivers reported in and were assigned routes and times. There was frustration and a feeling that drivers did not have even this small amount of control over their working lives.

The employer’s 1999 proposal on scheduling was also a method to relieve junior members from working less desirable times. For example one driver, Craig Watson recently commented, “under the old system I worked weekends for ten years, under the current system I had a better balance between weekends and weekdays.”

To create this flexibility the union and management agreed that more senior drivers could bid on weekend work in addition to their normally assigned hours. This would give the more junior members time off. The freely negotiated schedule did result in more overtime for those senior members – approximately 0.6% in 1999. The company said that while it supported the scheduling flexibility, it did not want to shoulder the additional cost, even though it was a small one.

The scheduling system now under assault by the City was the product of interest based negotiations in 1999 – for their efforts the Employer’s negotiators won an prestigious award for innovation and leadership. That isn’t being duplicated today.

As a result of those co-operative efforts made by workers and managers, employer and union, working conditions, morale, and service levels began to improve.

Then Larry O'Brien was elected Mayor of Ottawa.


Sources:
Ottawa Transit Strike - The History of the Current Scheduling System
The Canadian Encyclopedia: Ottawa Massacre

OC Transpo Union Chief - World's Worst Communicator

Some of you may have thought it was Stéphane Dion, but as OC Transpo workers start a strike that will impact thousands of members of the public, the award must go to Amalgamated Transit Union Local 279 President André Cornellier.

When you are a public sector union, public opinion is very important. I saw the union president interviewed on CTV and he came across as very arrogant and not caring about the public. I do not believe that he is, is but that is the impression he presented. And he failed to present the union's case very well, mainly because the facts he was trying to present got lost in his attitude.

And the union itself has not presented any information supporting their position on their website, not even a single press release.

So let me try to do what the union and it's president have failed to do so the public can see that the hard working OC Transpo workers do have a reason to strike.

The Ottawa Citizen reported the facts this way.

The union has been without a contract since March, and the two sides have held talks off and on over the months. Things heated up last week when the workers voted 98 per cent to reject a city offer and to give their leadership a strike mandate.
…

The main unresolved issues are wages, scheduling, sick leave and contracting out work.

The city is offering a three-year deal with three-, two- and two-per-cent wage increases in each year, retroactive to April 1st and a one-time $2,000 signing bonus to each member.

The union is proposing a three-year contract with increases of 3.5 per cent in each year and has said they will not accept smaller wage increases than other city unions have received recently, which are minimum three per cent per year.

The city is proposing to take some scheduling control away from workers in order to run operations more efficiently, while saying it will respect booking seniority rights. The union wants to maintain the current scheduling practices.

The city is looking to relax language about contracting out work, which prevents non-unionised workers from performing some duties, too.

So the first thing we note is that the union has given the bargaining process a long time to work before deciding it was necessary to go on strike to get the City and OC Transpo to pay attention to their concerns.

While this may not be a good time for the union to ask for new benefits, their major reason for striking is management's attempt to take away previously won contract provisions regarding scheduling and contracting out. If there is one thing that workers will strike for it is to protect hard earned rights and contract provisions, and attempts to replace their jobs with non-unionised contract employees. Such attempts are almost always certain to lead to strike action. According to the union, such attempts made in the past have always been withdrawn.

The one area that the union is asking for increased benefits is sick leave, where they are asking for the same sick leave provisions as other city workers. As well, in regards to wage increases, they are asking for the same increases given to other city employees.

These do not seem like extravagant demands being made by some of the hardest working city employees with very demanding and stressful working conditions.

So why has OC Transpo forced them to strike. One thing to note is that everyday OC Transpo operates it costs the city money. Everyday they are on strike the city saves money. An OC Transpo strike is an effective way for the city to save money while deflecting the blame for the inconvenience onto the OC Transpo workers and their union.

Is this a strategy dreamed up by Mayor Larry O'Brien or just the result of his arrogance and continued inability to lead the city.

Another Majority, Another Coup – Ottawa City Budget Passed

A majority of the members of Ottawa City Council passed the City budget last night and according to the Ottawa Citizen a "coup" has been staged by a "coalition" on Ottawa City Council and President Stephen Harper Mayor Larry O'Brien doesn't like it. How dare this coalition go against the elected President Mayor.

The city’s 2009 budget debates took a dramatic turn Monday night when a group of councillors, not including Mayor Larry O’Brien, brought and passed a package motion that results in 4.9-per-cent property-tax increase and avoids serious program cuts.

It was a coup from a new coalition on council made up of some very strange political bedfellows, and Mr. O’Brien was powerless to stop it.

As the Citizen reported:

Council had managed to close the gap by several million, and the meeting was heading into debate on some of the of more serious cuts to bus routes.

It was then that the coalition made its move with the package motion tabled by College Councillor Rick Chiarelli.

The coalition declined to make many of the cuts that more than 200 people had argued against during last week’s public submissions portion of the budget process.

Apparently if your not a right wing minority then your just another "coalition" imposing a "coup" and it just isn't right.

"How do I erase everything I've said so far?"

Resign. It won’t erase all the harm you have done to the city. But it’s a start.

Read and Listen

Detroit and Ottawa - Sisters in Shame

The Ottawa Citizen reports that “Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick and his former chief of staff Christine Beatty surrendered to police Monday, hours after the county's top prosecutor charged the pair with perjury, obstruction, conspiracy and misconduct, connected to allegations they lied under oath about their affair.”

The Detroit Mayor’s response was familiar to Ottawa residents: “Kilpatrick said in a written statement Monday that he would not step down from his duties and that he intends to fight the charges.”

However, unlike in Ottawa, Detroit City Council did the right thing and “voted 7-1 last week to call for Kilpatrick to resign”.

Of course they are not the only ones calling for the mayor to do the right thing. This column in the Detroit Free Press echoes the views of many Detroit residents when it states:

And let them begin without Kilpatrick as mayor. Count me among those who have seen enough of this distraction, who do not want to witness the indignities of the city's highest elected official on trial, who do not believe Detroit's many problems can or should be managed by a man facing serial felony charges.

I actually like the mayor and deeply respect the good things he has done for Detroit, the momentum he seems to engender just by filling a room with his energy and charisma. I desperately wanted him to succeed, as the first member of my generation of Detroiters chosen to lead.

But that's all moot now, a pipe dream being crowded by bitter realities. No matter what Kilpatrick says, he cannot help but be consumed by the effort to fight these charges.

His word already means nothing. And the damage to his ability to lead has been done, no matter what the legal outcome.

Love is, in part, knowing when to let go. So is true leadership. Kilpatrick can best show his love for Detroit, and the leadership the city once had faith in, by letting go of the stranglehold his flourishing scandal has on all of us.

These are words that perhaps Ottawa Mayor Larry O’Brien might also want to pay heed to.

Of course, O’Brien’ supporters will point out that there are significant differences in the charges facing the two mayors, That is certainly so. For one thing the charges against the Detroit mayor do not call into doubt the validity of his election.